


Teach me

by SkiraDeCorvus



Series: Tales of passion [1]
Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Frostiron Bang 2016, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-20
Updated: 2016-11-20
Packaged: 2018-09-01 02:21:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,190
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8603443
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SkiraDeCorvus/pseuds/SkiraDeCorvus
Summary: Written for the "frostiron Bang". I would do it again any time...When Wanda almost destroys the tower, the Avengers decide that she needs a teacher of the magic arts. Thor just knows the right person for this job but… Yes, but. Because with Thor, there is always a “but”. But in this case, the “but” might be the beginning of something beautiful…or disastrous, depending on your point of view and how close you will stay to the Avengters Tower in the future.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Postapokalypso](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Postapokalypso/gifts).



> This is the beginning of a series I was sponaniously inspired to write during the bang. 
> 
> Steve is out of character in the end but I don't really care about that. He is not the main person ;)

**Link to art trailer:[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RhEbP3HYY7o](https://deref-gmx.net/mail/client/AFRayIKsgvI/dereferrer/?redirectUrl=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DRhEbP3HYY7o)**

 

 

**Teach me**

 

 

 

„I know the right person for this task.”

 

That was the sentence that started this whole mess. And honestly, Thor is a big cute puppy, always trying to help others, but. Yes, but. BUT! There always seemed to be a “but” with Thor. A big, fat, destructive ‘BUT’.

He just wanted to make poptarts…BUT he set fire to the whole kitchen.

Thor just wanted to open the door..BUT then there was suddenly  a hole in the wall.

A big, fat, destructive BUT. Everywhere. One might be tempted to add a BUT to his name…Thor the butt. Thor the mighty butt of buts.

 

Tony Stark currently stared at the newest of Thor’s Buts…butses….butss. A tall, dark, slightly crazy but. The aforementioned but was unmovingly standing in his living room, glaring down at all of them over his straight nose and ignoring his brother who was talking animatedly next to him.

 

In relation to the burning kitchen, mild devastation to the load-bearing walls of Stark Tower and general chaos whenever he forgot his strength, this new ‘but’ seemed big. A big but in the middle of his living room.

 

Tony raised his hand slowly and waited until Thor finally noticed it and stopped his babbling. Nobody was listening anyway.

 

“Remind me again. How exactly did the god of fucking chaos end up in my tower?  Might I remind you, the same god who destroyed this city with an army of butt-ugly aliens at his command, the same leather-fetishist who threw me out of this window!”, he gestured to one of the many windows behind him.

 

Thor looked at him nonplussed, like it was obvious why his megalomaniac brother stood there in shackles.

 

“You requested aid. That’s why I brought him.”, the blonde god finally answered and patted Loki on the back. At least that served to amuse Stark, as the smaller god stumbled a step forward.

 

“We requested nothing and surely nothing that would require your brothers presence.”, Tony insisted and shot aforementioned demigod his dirtiest look. Loki refused to crumble and met his stare with one of his own.

 

“We kind of did Stark. And – not to brag – but I suspected something like this to happen.”, Natasha piped up suddenly and all eyes turned to her.

“What? When? Who?”, the immediate question were shot her way. The Russian assassin did not blink an eye but sighed. A sign of clear disapproval for her usually stoic behavior.

 

“Last week. And you guys should start listening to your own conversations.”, she answered before turning on her heels and leaving the room.

 

 

*** One week earlier ***

 

“This is not acceptable!”

Tony stalked around his tower, fire extinguisher in his hand and a slightly shaken Barton in tow.

“I am Tony Stark! I do not want to play firefighter in my own tower! That’s what I invented J.A.R.V.I.S. and the whole mechanic gang for!”, he carped and took an other small fire as his new target.

 

“But nooooo….”, he aimed at an other nest of embers and extinguished it thoroughly before changing his way and stalking back up to  the main processor of the tower.

“She just HAD to fry every single A.I. in the whole tower and set a goddamn fire to my property! That’s treason! I give her a place to live, I let her train here, I feed her and she destroys everything! There is a significant part of my tower laying on the street that was designed to be way above the tarmac! The fucking ‘A’ is missing completely! We are now officially the ‘vengers’ – courtesy of Misses Wanda Maximoff.”

 

Barton sighed and opened a panel in the wall next to him. The incident had happened two hours ago and Stark just did not shut up about it.

“Yeah, and some of us got even scorched. “,  he interrupted Stark’s rant. The inventor really shut up and turned to the archer.

 “Oh, yeah. Forgot about that completely.”, he admitted after a second of awkward silence.

 

The archer sighed, and muttered “Burn the witches. And don’t forget about the mad inventors…” under his breath and kept on checking the cables. At least the damage did not seem too bad here.

 

*** 4 hours later ***

 

Bruce was still cleaning his glasses when all of the avengers finally trickled into the spacious room. Most of them in physically good shape but Barton and Thor showed clear signs of exposition to fire. Their singed hair and the dark splotches of soot in their faces were a dead giveaway.

Stark also looked like that but most likely it was just because of an extended stay in the innards of the tower. Even the best A.I. could not keep everything as clean as desired there.

 

“Where is the little culprit?”, Stark opened the conversation without any pleasantries. Nobody would have expected any. After all, it was his tower and his J.A.R.V.I.S that took the brunt of the hit this time and he was territorial about his things.

 

“She is in her room. Meditating, trying to get it under control. As far as I could talk to her, she just lost her focus for a moment…or the focus lost her.”, Bruce answered and shrugged with his shoulders when the other Avengers looked at him suspiciously.

“To be honest, that whole ‘magic’ thing is way beyond my expertise. I don’t know how I can help her. Nobody knows how to help her. And…S.H.I.E.L.D called. Fury to be exactly. I’ll spare you the details, even though he was very resourceful with his insults today but they want to collect Wanda and lock her up. He did not say it that explicitly but it was not hard to decipher. ”, he admitted with a sad tone.

 

Silence encompassed the room as each one of them followed his or her own thoughts. If even Bruce, the master of meditation, self-control and countenance could not teach Wanda how to keep this force under control, then who could?

 

“We need a professional, somebody who can teach her. Preferably  somebody who is a witch and knows all of this mumbojumbo before our beloved leader decides to take her away. Any suggestions?”, Tony admitted for all of them.

And whenever Tony Stark willingly asked for help, you knew that something was way beyond problematic.

 

And then Thor uttered the sentence that started all the mess:

„I know the right person for this task.”

 

 

 

*** Present time ***

 

“Are. You. Kidding. Me?”

That’s all Tony Stark said before walking to his well-stocked bar and filling a glass of Scotch for himself.

“We did not ask you to bring HIM here!”, Barton accused the god of thunder with fiery eyes. Tony gave the archer about 10 minutes before he jumped Tor’s brother and started strangling him. Luckily Tony gave himself only about 5 minutes before he would activate one of his suits and beat Loki to a pulp. Would be a shame if his revenge would be spoiled by the archer.

 

“You requested an wielder of magic and I brought you one.”, Thor insisted still without a clue what he did wrong.

 

Barton threw his hands in the air before screaming. “You could have brought anybody but him! There have to be others in your golden city of superiority who can pull a rabbit out of a hat! Anybody but him! Let him rot in a cell, throw him into a dungeon! But what were you thinking when you brought him here!?”

 

“I would never bring anybody to aid my friends but the best.”, Thor answered seriously. He threw a look at his brother and looked almost proud.

Tony snorted into his Scotch and grinned smugly over at Loki. Both brothers defied his look.

 

“He’s the best? “, he repeated before emptying his glass and setting it aside.

“My brother is by far the best magician in all of Asgard. Only the best warriors can best him.”, Thor confirmed and Loki groaned next to him. Obviously the younger one had more foresight than his golden brother.

 

 “Then let’s test his abilities…thoroughly.”

Stark grinned darkly.

 

*** So it starts ***

 

As usual the laboratory in Stark Tower was a mess. Parts were everywhere and nobody could determine if they were a new project or the debris of the latest explosion. Behind a wall of glass (of course highest security standard-glass) stood the whole group of Avengers sans Thor. The Asgardian was still next to his brother and fumbled with the big cuffs he wore.

Loki on the other hand seemed to take in every last detail of the room he was in.

 

“Are you sure that he is a magician? I do not sense any power coming from him.”, Wanda asked skeptically and interrupted Tony and Bruce who were calibrating the sensors in the room. Both men looked at each other and shrugged with their shoulders.

“Did I see him doing anything I might not be able to repeat with technology and time? No. Nothing like that. It’s Thor who says that he is a magician. And my sensors also don’t detect anything from his side at the moment. Nothing out of the ordinary at least. But on the other hand side, his readings from his last time here in the tower are a mess. I’m still not sure if J.A.R.V.I.S. had a malfunction or if this guy is really emitting more energy than one of my reactors. That’s the reason I put him in this box. There are sensors everywhere. I will catch every last information I can get this time.”, Tony insisted and activated the next bunch of sensors. Thermal ones this time.

 

Silent the Avengers kept on looking at the two brothers in the chamber before Barton got bored again.

“Are you finally ready in there? How long can it take to open these things?”, came Barton’s voice over the intercom. But it was Loki who answered for his brother.

“These cuffs are nothing like the restrictions you prefer to use here in Midgard. They are embedded with magic little bird and only the one who closed them can open them again and only by free will. Were I to threaten Thor into opening them, he would not even be able to do so. They have to be handled with care, so do all of us a favor and do not pester us with your stupidity.”, Loki grinned at his brother with melee before continuing. “And of course my dear Thor is afraid to loosen the spell too much for me to break free of these restrictions. Wouldn’t it be a shame to report to your father, that you lost track of me again? After you begged so prettily to borrow me for the little witch?”, he hissed and met Scarlet Witch’s eyes behind the glass. Both of them refused to break the contact first.

 

“Is it just me, or does he seem happy to be cuffed?”, Bruce asked with a frown while studying the readings on the cuffs. The sensors could not detect anything weird with them. They seemed to be just made off very sturdy metal.

 

“He is trying to distract Thor into making a mistake?”, Natasha offered while her right hand crept in the general direction of her gun before Tony snorted very loudly behind her.

“Come on, don’t let him get to you. He is just bragging about it.”, he answered before continuing when the others looked at him questioningly.

“Look, as far as I got the story from Thor, he was always the second one. Odin always put Thor first. Thor, the future ruler of Asgard. Thor, the best fighter of Asgard. Thor, the first son of Asgard. Loki always was the second one. Nobody looked at him twice because he only was the second son. Not important enough to be bothered with. But now he gets the fancy cuffs that bind him. He is important now if only as a threat to Asgard and Earth. And, well….he is Loki. He is narcissistic, he wants to be the number one and he likes to give a show.”, he concluded finally, when the door to the chamber opened and Thor  exited.

 

*****

 

“I opened his cuffs. Whenever you say so, I will give him the ability to use his magic to any extend you need for your studies.”, he said and placed two metal bands on the table with a heavy ‘thunk’.

“Got it big guy. This will be so much fun! Bruce? All sensors online?”

The engineer flitted from one station to the other and activated little buttons all over the place.

“Temperature-sensors online, radiation-sensors online, motion-sensors online. Everything I have is online and sending information. No hitches, no outages. I am 100% ready over here. Anytime you are ready Tony.”, the other scientist confirmed.

 

“J.A.R.V.I.S., I want you to shut down everything two floors above and below the chamber. Shut down anything we do not really need. I do not want any  interferences distorting the readings. “, Tony ordered his AI and shortly after got the confirmation.

 

“Thor, release him.”, Tony ordered and concentrated on his sensors like the other Avengers concentrated on Loki behind the glass. The Asgardian god closed his eyes and mumbled something lowly under his breath.

 

As if he heard his brother through the barrier, Loki’s head suddenly shot up. A grin appeared on his face when he turned his face towards the ceiling and closed his eyes.

“Welcome back.”, he whispered and drew a deep breath through his nose before he spread his arms and straightened his whole posture. Without any kind of warning, suddenly green flames erupted from his hands and started creeping upwards until they engulfed the whole figure. Taking deep breaths, Loki concentrated on his magic. Too long he was not allowed to use her and she was impatient and wild in his veins. Equally to be used and to use the magician. She wanted to change and explore everything. Stretching as far as she could reach, she claimed back the vessel this hagfish named Odin denied her for far too long. She had no time to ease Loki into her presence but flooded every cell at the same time with all her force. She knew him all his life, he would gladly endure the pain she put him through just  to feel her again. They were together since the little runtling was born. She was the one who changed his glamour in front of Odin to protect him from the wrath of the old fart. She was one of the oldest sources in all the universes and she would keep Loki safe as long as she could. In the end they were united not only in this body, but also in his mind. She was a force without physical incorporation and he was a physical being. Like all magicians he knew that without her, he would be nothing, a mere being without any magic and without him, she would be trapped in the ether and without the possibility to enter the physical realm.

 

“Whoah…”, Tony breathed in awe when his sensors finally showed up their readings. They were massive to say the least. Some of the sensors even just shorted out because of the input they could not process. And the ones still operating were reaching their limits fast. A quick view away from his sensors into the chamber revealed a sight to behold. Thor’s brother had his eyes scrunched shut tight and his mouth opened into a silent scream, while his whole body was engulfed in an aura of the most mesmerizing shades of green and black. They were dancing around his lithe body almost like real fire would.

“I can’t believe it. He is bursting with magic.”, Wanda backed up the engineers eloquent sentence with something the others could understand. Not that anybody was listening. Every single one of them seemed to be enthralled by the sight in front of them and so she stepped up to the window. Placing a hand on it and closing her eyes, Wandas own magic stretched out to meet Lokis. Deep red tendrils wove through the barrier and crept closer and closer to the other magician.

 

Natasha was the first one of the others to see something red creep into her peripheral line of sight and broke through the spell she felt when looking at the intrinsic pattern Loki’s magic wove. Before anybody else could react or even see what happened next to them, the assassin was next to her team member.

 

“Wanda. Stop that.”

 

*****

 

“Wanda. Stop that.”, Natasha insisted with a levelled voice but the witch did not even seem to hear her. Without wasting a second Natasha grabbed her arm and tried to yank it away from the window, to somehow wake Wanda out of her stupor. The only thing she acquired was a feeling she never felt before as the red magic froze her movement and Wanda’s cold eyes met hers.

 

And finally the others caught up on what was happening and started to react when they saw the red sheen engulfing Natasha next to them.

“Wanda!”, Tony shouted and ran over to Natasha, not daring to touch the Russian spy but wanting to help her anyhow.

“Wanda! Listen to me!”, he tried again in vain. And then  Natasha started to scream when her body was lifted off the ground and hovered in front of Wanda. Frantically Tony tried to get Wanda to concentrate on him but her eyes seems glassed over with some kind of swirling mist that clouded her sight.

“Wanda! Stop it!”, he tried again and again. “Stop it! You are hurting her!”

 

“Stark, step back!”, Barton interrupted behind him before Tony could hear the creak of a sinew being stretched. Next to him Steve tried to simultaneously shout at Barton to lower the bow and at Stark to finally do something. All in all the present Avengers did a damn fine job in shouting around and generally not knowing what exactly to do. Except Natasah – who still squirmed helplessly in the air and tried to get enough air into her lungs, or whatever this magic mist was doing to her that made her squirm like a worm on a line.

 

“Ah, now I can see why you were so eager to bring me here. And I thought it was because you missed my company so dearly, brother.”, Loki’s calm voice cut through the chaos and froze each one of them in the second before they each slowly turned around to him.  Thor was standing next to his brother, one hand still at the door of the chamber he put him in before, his eyes hard on Loki’s face and the other hand tightly clasped around his brothers’ shoulder.

“And you, little vermin.”, he addressed Barton with a disgusted sneer in his voice, “put that bow down, or do you truly wish to die today and kill all of your friends?”, he spat before taking a step in Wanda’s direction. Thor’s hand stopped him immediately and tore him back the same step he had taken.

 

“Stop this pointless banter and help her. You know what is on the line for you, so act as if you still value your life brother. For once do what is in your best interest. She is a magic wielder with no control over her powers. Do not let it happen again brother.”, he insisted without any of his usual friendliness but looking dead serious. The look he gave Loki was equal parts angry and pleading and surprisingly it slowly started to reflect on the face of his counterpart. Slowly Loki lowered his eyes and took a deep breath.

When he raised his head again, there was a crooked smile on his face.

“Take your friends and get out. I will take care of the rest here. You know what to do.”, he promised and was gifted a bright smile in return and another squeeze to his shoulder that made him wince just a little bit before he was released and concentrated on Wanda again.

 

*****

Magic in itself tended to be challenging. Not for nothing magic wielders were rare although magic itself was everywhere and in everything to a certain extend.

Almost every living being in existence knows about magic in one way or another. Some might call it “a feeling in the guts”, some call it “foreboding” and some call it “vibes” but it is there. Everywhere, all-encompassing, inherent.

Then, there are the ones that can tap into magic and use it. Oracles, clairvoyants, some of the higher evolved species in Yggdrasil’s branches that use the magic energy around them and can concentrate it in their bodies for short amounts of time.

 

And then there are the ones that are born with magic in their very being. Some scholars even postulated that these individuals would have never been born, if their magic were not there. Not that they were ‘made’ by magic, no. They were conceived like every other child and some of them – like the woman in front of him – did not even know what they were capable of for a long time of their life, or even never found out. But without magic they would not have developed or would have perished  shortly after being conceived.

These scholars even tried to validate their theory and found a way to somehow extract every last bit of magic from a poor soul they got their hands on somehow. The results were interesting in their eyes, others found it repulsive and every born magic-wielder who heard about their little experiment called it a crime and swore eternal vengeance.

The magician they used for it called it many things.  After ripping out his eyes with his bare fingers, he proceeded to bash his head into the next wall until they tied him up.  That was when he started screaming out his agony and every madness imaginable in all the worlds until his vocal chords ripped and he almost drowned in his own blood.

Before he was exposed to the scholars studies, he called himself Herlan. He was a husband, a father, a magician, a member of the magic warguilde of Asgard. He was a mentor of some younglings that still had to learn their first spells and he was a good teacher. Always patient, always understanding but never negligent in his duties.

 

And when the guild finally was able to find and free him after more than a month, he did not recall his old life or his wife and children. He did not recall to have ever been a magician or a member of the warguilde. The scholars were to be brought before Odin and the council but somehow – and nobody present there at the time would dare to respeak the word of the high-magician in that matter – all of them died that night at their own hands.

 

Months later, some of the mightiest magicians Asgard could summon up were able to reverse the scholar’s vicious deed and call back the magic. But it did not go as planned. Herlan’s magic was feral, untamed and wild in every aspect. She lashed out and consumed him in body and mind after she laid waste to the chambers of the warguilde.

Herlan did not longer inhabit the body before them.

 

Loki still regretted to have participated in this ritual til this day but nevertheless he had learned many things on this wretched day. Especially what is magic is able to do. He just hoped, that the little witches magic responded kinder than Herlan’s.

 

 

 

*****

Well, if that was not funny. Only five minutes ago Loki was standing in the exact same spot, the Avengers were standing now in differing states of confusion or – like especially Barton displayed – panic as all of them changed rooms as quickly as possible. Only Thor seemed to be collected and calm after he ushered all of the remaining Avengers into the Chamber and closed the door behind them. Bruce not so much. After Thor had hauled him over his shoulder in the control room and dumped him in the corner farthest away from the door in the chamber, the scientist was a shivering mess who kept on mumbling how much he hated magic. Sometimes a green sheen came to his eyes but was beaten down immediately by him again. An episode within the confines of this chamber, with all of the other Avengers in the same room, would end in a disaster. And of that they had enough at their hands at the moment with Wanda and her out-of-control magic in the other room…and a crazy demigod who should stop her.

 

“What did he do?!”, Barton hissed at Thor while Loki and Wanda still had their silent stand-off in the other room. It seemed almost like a freeze frame as both of them had not moved even an inch since Thor sent of his brother and collected Bruce and the Avengers. At least Natasha did not seem to suffocate any longer if the relaxed position of her head was anything to go by. She seemed dazed and still hovered in the air, surrounded by the red mist of Wandas magic, but at least she was alive and not in immediate danger for the moment.

 

“He did not do anything. Wandas magic is out of control!”, Thor insisted with absolute conviction  while his eyes darted around the room, searching for something.

“Then why did something like that never happen before! Only after your batshit-crazy brother is here, Wanda suddenly tries to kill Natasha! I swear, if anything happens to her, I’m gonna kill that bastard!”, the archer spat and stepped up to Thor in a threatening manner. Not that he could ever hope to beat Thor, but nevertheless he made a point. Thor met him with the same determination and refused to budge even an inch.

“We don’t have time for this.”, he persisted.

 

“Sir, unfortunately I can not exactly interpret the incoming data but several radiation-levels and the general energy output are rising in alarming rates in the chamber and fluctuating. At the moment the fluctuations are significant but stable but I can detect a decisive factor emitting from Miss Wanda that is growing steadily in its intensity. I would suggest to immediately leave the vicinity of Mister Loki and Miss Wanda for your own safety.”, Jarvi’s voice interrupted the ruckus quite efficiently and made Tony scowl.

“But the sensors are in this room…”, Bruce muttered bewildered and met Tony’s eyes for a short second. “Tony..this is not good. If the sensors can still collect rising levels over this distance…”, Bruce broke off the sentence in a pregnant pause and struggled to his unsteady feet.

“Yeah, I get the synopsis Bruce. We are sitting here like ducks, waiting to be grilled. And however fascinating it might be to finally get some kind of data on magic, I still would prefer to survive without permanent radiation damage. So...Thor? Buddy? Any suggestions? Ideas? Portals to get us the fuck out of here? Like about NOW?” , Tony took over the conversation.

 

 “As I said, we don’t have  time for this.”, Thor dismissed Barton finally and stretched out his hand to the archer.

“Your knife. I know you are carrying one.”, he demanded. And he was right. Both Natasha and him always carried at least one knife with them. Old habits never died.

“What would you..hey!”, the archer was interrupted in the middle of his sentence, when Thor unceremoniously grabbed him and reached into each of his pockets and his waistband before pulling out his best knife. Without hesitation Thor sliced his palm alarmingly deep in Bruce’s opinion and dipped the fingers of his unsliced hand deep into the oozing blood, before smearing the red substance on the partition glass before him. First he made a big circle on his left side, then he added two parallel lines from top to bottom. Then  he repeated the same symbol on his right side, leaving about two arms lengths in the middle where he started to draw something resembling a circle. A bit crooked and the trickling blood surely did not help the general outlay. Another circle, overlapping the first, took shape slowly. Obviously Thor had to concentrate more for this special design, if his sudden slowness and the tip of his pink tongue between his teeth was anything to go by.

 

Tony squinted behind Thor into his lab when he decided that his inquisitiveness had to be satisfied even in this situation. He was Tony Stark, he wanted to know and see everything. And how many times did one have the chance to experience real magic live? What he saw on the other side of the glass was A, not exactly what he expected and B, made him take a cautious step back.

“Thor, I really hope you know what you are doing over there but whatever it is, hurry up.”, Tony stressed with an almost toneless voice while he kept on staring at the green and red tendrils of magic across from him. The same tendrils as before but this time they really touched or, more accurately described, the red ones seemed to be stabbing at the green ones which in turn seemed to try to curl around the red ones and prevented them from advance further into Loki’s territory. But the same way they almost seemed like tentacles, at the same time they were not substantial and dispersed into a foglike state wherever they touched, only to form new shapes elsewhere and to attack each other again.

To be honest, Wandas red energy-tentacles seemed more…potent and aggressive? Was that a valid description? They attacked more often than they were attacked and they definitely seemed brighter than Loki’s green energy. But that could be an illusion of the different colors. Heck, what was he thinking about? He did not know the first thing about magic. Literally anything could be happening over there at the moment and he would not know anything about it, if it did not hit him over the head personally.

What made Tony’s skin crawl with dread were not the tendrils. No, the odd thing were the two individuals in the room. Each one of the two enclosed in their respective colors were staring at each other and not showing any kind of surrender, their eyes lit in the colors they fought with. They seemed determined to keep going but whatever exactly magic was – and if Jarvi’s readings were anything to go by it was assuredly a massive accumulation of energy – it seemed to take its toll on them. Wanda was breathing hard, her thorax raising and falling in quick succession, her hands clenched at her sides. And Loki? The Asgardian seemed to cope better with the strain if his regular breathing was an indicator even if the sheen of sweat above his brows told a slightly different story. But he seemed to control himself better than Wanda.

 

A glance to Thor revealed two more circles on the glass, each overlapping the others and a fifth one in the final making. A flower, it was looking somehow like a flower. A blood-flower. Great.

Then everything happened at once. Thor raising his bloody hand to the middle of the flower, smashing his hand hard on the glass – and that just had to hurt with that cut in his palm, Asgardian demigod or not – and leaving a gory imprint there, Wanda throwing her right hand forward in the direction of Loki and spreading her fingers, Loki sagging down on one knee and crossing both arms in front of his face and then a searing white light took away Tony’s eyesight. Reflexively he shielded his eyes with his arms and tried to drop to the flow before the unavoidable shock wave would hit him and surely liquefy his intestines. He always knew he would not live long enough to die of old age, but liquefaction by magic was not even in his top 30 ways to go.....

 

 

*****

 

The shockwave came as expected and exploded the reinforced glass between the two rooms into a million pieces, sharp pieces that could potentially shish kebab every poor soul in the chamber. But the glass never touched them.

When he still did not feel the anticipated pain all over his body after two seconds, Tony warily raised his head and took a look at his surroundings.

“Fuck me..”, he hissed when he saw a glass shard the size of his forearm hovering in front of his face inclosed in an eerie green sheen and rotating slowly around it’s axis. It almost seemed to be caught in time. And not just this one. Everything in his line of sight was frozen in the middle of the air and shimmering. It looked almost pretty, all the glass shards reflecting that green light and casting the whole room in a glittering green light.

Slowly and gingerly Tony touched the big shard and watched as it suddenly dropped to the floor, as if his touch dissolved whatever was holding it stationary.

“What the heck?”, Tony breathed and stood up. Fascinated he watched other shards fall to the floor as soon as he touched them. With every slow step he took, he heard the soft jangling of shards and just for the fun of it he touched some bigger ones near him and listened to them falling to the floor.

“Bruce? Tasha? Clint? Cap? Where are you?”, he called for the others when it was too hard to see through all the glittering shards in the room. No answer.

“Jarvis?”, he tried but also his reliable AI did not answer his calls. Slowly Tony turned around and tried to find out where to go. Was it just him, or did the green glow intensify? Could you get greenmagic-blind like hikers got snow-blind after some time if they did not take care?

“Stark? Follow my voice!” ,a faint voice finally answered his calls but unfortunately it was just the one he did not want to hear. Nevertheless he turned around and made his way through the glass to the other side. He was sure now that he did not just imagine the increased light. It was getting annoying and Tony almost could not see anything anymore. He squinted his eyes and went on more or less blind now.

 “Loki?”, Tony asked and took an other blind step forward, shielded his eyes with one hand and stretched out the other one in an attempt to feel possible obstacles before bumping into them nose first.

There was a curious feeling in the arm he stretched out and especially in his fingers. A tingle of some sort, familiar somehow and similar to the one he had when he had worked with the hadron collider some years ago. But a magnetic field could not be the source, or the metal of his reactor would have reacted to it way sooner than his nerves.

Tony moved his arm a bit and the feeling changed, got weaker on the right side and stronger on the left side. Somehow Tony slowly felt like he was sitting in the middle of a trap and with a deep feeling of imminent danger and he did not know where to go! He stood there in the middle of sharp shards, blinded by magic and when did that static humming start? He could not remember but now it seemed as if it had always been there in the background but he was just too busy touching the floating shards to sense it.

Following a feeling he went to the left side where the charge in the air seemed to increase. It just seemed the right way to go to him. Tony knew that there was something important he should do, something he had to do, somewhere he just had to be. The magnetic field was clearly increasing with every step and the humming got clearer and clearer in his ears. It was a voice…or many voices. All talking to him, whispering in his ears, calling for him with their sirens call. Sweet voices, voices he seemed to know, drawing him in, telling him every secret in the universe if he just followed them long enough.

 

_Follow our voice_

“Stark!”

 

A promise of knowledge was whispered in his ear, every knowledge he would ever want, every knowledge he could even imagine. The voices did not use the terms Tony knew, they used terms way older than humanity, even older than the gods but still, Tony understood them.

 

_Come to us_

“Leave him!”

 

Whatever he would want, they would give him. Power, knowledge, prestige, love, all of it would be his without having to ask. Given by others but commanded by them.

 

_You are the one we were waiting for_

“NO!”

 

They needed him for what he was. Special, needed and loved by them. They were familiar with him and every aspect of his being. All the good sides and all the bad sides. They knew and they accepted him the way he was.

 

_You are one of us…._

 

Arms slung around his upper body and tried to pull him away from the voices he so desperately needed to be with. Tony started struggling and clawed at the hands around him with feral determination. He would not be taken away from here. All the knowledge he ever wanted was just a step away. Just one more step!

But the arms did not let go. They kept him where he was and that was just not acceptable! He wrenched around, ready to what? Bite? Yes, he would bite whoever dared to keep him tethered here. Whoever kept him away from everything he ever wanted.

 

But he froze, when he saw the entity now before him. Two green orbs, shining with the light of both dying stars and ones that were not even born, vast and endless. Life and death. An endless entity that could be everywhere and nowhere at the same time and that was in contact with the branches of Yggdrasil. Something as old as the voices in his head that still tried to tempt him to turn around and follow them. They were strong, but not as strong as the one voice before him.

“Do not listen to them. They lie and deceive…more so than me little mortal.”, he was told and finally recognized the sorcerer in front of him.

“What are you?”, Tony breathed in awe and rose his right hand to touch the surface of the creature in front of him. To caress this god and show him the respect he deserved.

 

Loki shied away from Tony’s touch as if he was burned by his mere presence.

“You know me. I am Loki. You _need_ to follow me now. Don’t look back.”, he insisted but did not answer Tony’s questions.

 

“Yes, you are Loki. But you are so much more at the same time. Tell me.”, Tony insisted and finally, finally was able to lay his palm on Loki’s cheek. A violent spark of energy jumped over and made him gasp, bowing his back and searching for even more contact with Loki. It was illogical and bordered on madness, but Tony needed it. More!

 

A heartbeat long there was no reaction, just these green windows to the universe and everything beyond staring at him like they could see his soul – well, they might as well be able to see his essence. Tony wound his other arm around the infinite body of Loki, tried to grasp him before he would dare to slip away, his right hand slowly, oh so slowly roaming lower to Loki’s throat, back to his neck, always following the current of the spark he felt in his fingers.

And only now Tony realized that the incorporate being had taken a form before his eyes. The endless vastness had shaped back into a corporal body at his touch as if Tony’s touch alone had commanded him to. And now all Tony could see was the lean figure of Loki, clad in a black suit with a black tie and black shirt. Not the most trendy style but everything else would not have been him.

 

“What is it that you see in me mortal?”, Loki finally asked him still disbelievingly and mirroring Tony’s exploration of the other.

“Loki…Life…”, Tony strained to reach Loki’s face, to plant his lips on the face of the god before him. “Death,…”, he searched the eyes of Loki, registering the dark shadows crossing the green orbs and the way they waited for his verdict. “Rebirth. Lies so intricate, only you can weave them as you are the god of lies. Truths, hurtful and devastating, powerful enough to tear down kingdoms and unleash war upon all life..”, he finally, finally was able to press his mouth on Loki’s and met no resistance but rather speechlessness.

“Passion for everything you put your heart to. Compassion for the ones you care for. Destruction for the ones that dare touch what is yours.”, Tony kept on whispering between his kisses.

 

“But there is so much more to you, beyond my grasp. I need you to tell me Loki. What are you?”, Tony insisted and wound his fingers in the hair on Loki’s neck, tugging at it demandingly. The sorcerer followed without resistance and Tony was not sure if he encouraged the action or if he was overwhelmed by the truths Tony told him. Most likely it was a mixture of both.

“What I am can not be told mortal. I was made more by birth and less by upbringing.”, Loki conceded cryptically. As if that explanation would satisfy a man like Tony.

“Why not?”, he murmured into Loki’s neck, taking in the intoxicating smell of the god.

“Not even I can express in words what I am, how could a mere mortal like you ever reach a state of mind where you would be able to really see?”, Loki’s hands tried to shove Tony away but he refused to move. He felt right where he was. Here, near Loki, near the beginning and the end and so much more in between.

 

“Then teach me.”, his statement had the air of finality and left no room for negotiations. This was his will and even Loki would bow to it, Tony was sure of it. Indeed the god nodded with a dazed expression even when Tony’s hand took hold of his tie and dragged him nearer.

 

*****

 

With a groan the inventor opened his eyes and tried to roll on his side. Strong hands kept him where he was and slowly the voices started to filter into his brain again.

“Tony! What happened?”

 

That had to be Steve. The commanding sound mixed with concern was unmistakable, even when Tony still had the impression that something with the sound was just off. Muffled and not really full if that made any sense.

 

“I don’t know. YOU tell me. Last thing I know is Thor finger-painting with his blood on my windows.”, Tony answered and started a new attempt at changing his position. If he was not allowed to roll to his side, then maybe they would allow him to at least sit up.

 

This time nobody stopped him and after shaking his head several times he took in the destruction that once seemed to be his laboratory. Debris everywhere, lamps that clung to the ceiling only by a thread and dust in the air. He himself tended to wreck havoc in this rooms but most of the time he at least left the structural integrity mostly intact. This scenario was something way more destructive and called for a complete rebuild of every wall.

 

“We are not exactly sure what happened after Wanda attacked. There was a moment of…I don’t even know how to describe it. There was light, a humming, I felt weightless like drifting in space and when I opened my eyes again it looked like that here. Except you were laying on the ground and the whole room was a battlefield.”, Steve told him while he helped him to stand up slowly. Tony just nodded. There was nothing to say.

 

“The others?”, he inquired when his first leg was finally where it belonged and did not make an attempt at collapsing under his weight.

“Everybody is fine Tony, Tasha and Clint are with Wanda and Bruce on the way to the medic bay. Nothing serious. She was awake when they scooped her up. Just exhausted and full of reproaches as always when her magic lashes out. She will be fine.”, Steve assured him before throwing a gaze over his shoulder.

“Loki is the only one still out for the count but Thor is with him and he says that he will be fine. Jarvis confirmed that his biological parameters are not worrying…”, Steve kept on talking but Tony did not listen anymore.

 

Loki. The entity with eyes as vast as the universe, the voices, the feeling of being touched on a level no human could ever even think to touch. A shove to his sternum, that catapulted him through dimensions, time and space and sent him back here. Everything came back to him and flooded his mind. How could he have forgotten this even for one second?

Before Steve could even react, Tony was already on the way to the other room, clambering over the remains of the wall between the two rooms and skidding to a halt next to Thor in the middle of the room before crouching down and taking Loki’s head in his hands.

He looked pale and drawn and his eyes moved like mad behind their lids.

 

“Tony?”, Steve asked suspiciously from the other room and Thor laid a hand on his shoulder.

“Do not worry, he will…”, Thor started but was silenced by Tony in the middle of his sentence. Tony had no time to find out what exactly made Thor shut up. It was either his “Shut it you idiot!”, or something in his eyes as Tony did not harbor any kind of friendly feelings for the blonde god at the moment. He had other things to worry about. Mainly the black-haired deity in front of him.

 

“Loki, I will just say this once, so you better listen well to me you insufferable ass. Do not listen to them, come back to us. They are lying. Whatever they are telling you, it is all a lie. You told me so yourself so you better listen to your own words and haul ass over there. You brought me back from there so do not think for a minute, that I would let you rot there for eternity. And do you really want me of all people to set my mind to come get you? I swear, I will punch a hole into every dimension until I find you…and then I will physically drag your sorry ass back here and I will gloat forever about the fact that I had to save you like a damsel in distress. And you will have no way to make me stop except killing me. And I think the two of us have established that this is not something you want to do in the foreseeable future.”

The words were not spoken in a harsh tone or in any way commanding, but Tony still knew that Loki would hear him. Hell, he would have heard him if he had spoken to him from Mars. He just had to listen!

And Tony really hoped that he listened to him, because he really would find a way to find the deity otherwise. No matter where his mind was at the moment, Tony would find him and drag him back.

 

Nonetheless he still bowed down further to whisper two short sentences to him.

“Your sorry ass belongs to me now. And I take care of what is mine.”

 

Seconds ticked by in silence. Thor still did not dare to move or speak – something only more uncommon that Tony shutting up for a lengthy period of time - and Steve was too stunned to interrupt so he just stood there and watched.

 

For Tony the seconds could have been days as well the way they stretched into eternity. And then finally Loki made a deep gasp and shot up, his green eyes moving frantically in all directions before he scrambled backwards, away from Thor and Tony with a haunted look in his eyes.

 

Thor – the insufferable goodhearted idiot – wanted to follow his brother immediately and stretched out a hand placatingly.

“Brother..”, he started when Loki’s eyes focused on him and anger overtook the frightened look in them.

 

“You!”, he hissed and dodged Thors hand expertly. Years of training in escaping his brothers bone crushing hugs Tony suspected.

“You…you idiot! Do NOT lay a hand on me! You are even duller than I thought! You could just break my neck if you want to get rid of me!”, Loki kept on breathing fire and brimstone, his hands and fingers moving in a way that indicated, that he was trying to summon his magic. But she did not come to him. He was not able to use her at the moment. Tony knew, no he felt it, but Thor still lifted his hands in a placating gesture as if he just could not feel it and was afraid to get burned alive by his brother.

 

“I would never do such a thing to you brother and you must know that! I brought you here to make amends and redeem yourself in the eyes of our father. I did not touch you, I swear!”, Thor begged with eyes that could melt stone. Loki did not seem to be impressed and threw a rock after his brother’s head. That was…impressively anticlimactic and Tony was hard pressed to keep his laughter subdued. Mighty sorcerer, entity of eternity and now desperate enough to throw debris after his brother while sitting there covered in dust and grime. But  Tony had to give him points for sheer mulishness.

 

“You put me in the vicinity of not only one sorceress I had to control, but a second one too that I had no idea about! Do you know what could have happened!? They fed off my magic! Both of them! And you stupid blonde oaf drained me even further with your sigils! And they were wrong too! They took away much more of me than would have been necessary if you would just finally learn how to draw them you inconsiderate tard! You could have killed all of us you inconsiderate buffoon!”, Loki screamed at Thor and kept on throwing stones. Thor accepted them with grace and did not even flinch at the impacts.

 

“Wow. That was an impressive amount of swearwords in your little monolog there. But I don’t think he knew about me. Hell, even I did not know about it and you yourself were surprised, so give him some slack. Not that it is not funny to watch you sit there and throw stones like a preschooler but …”, Tony was interrupted by a flurry of black and green that was followed by an impressive amount of dust that flung itself in his direction and pressed the air out of his lungs.

 

“How could you not have known mortal? Do not tell me that you did not know about it!”, Loki hissed when strong arms grabbed him and dragged him off Tony. Steve and Thor exchanged sorrowful looks while Loki struggled and screamed between them with a desperation even his brother did not see often in him.

 

“Loki, I beg you. Calm down! You do not make sense!”, Thor begged his brother while Tony slowly stood up from the floor.

“He is right Thor. We almost killed him. Not deliberately but still we endangered his life and that of everybody else here.”, Tony interrupted and stepped up to Loki.

“But that does not give you the right to go on a rampage in my tower!”, he emphasized his statement with a sharp finger to Loki’s breastbone.

“We did not know it Loki, believe me. Thor made a mistake with the sigils but we did not know about me. How should we? We do not have that many magic users here on earth. And the ones we have are either untrained idiots like your brother or loose weapons like Wanda. How should they ever reach a level where they would be able to detect magic in others? I do not know what awoke it, weather it was the vicinity to you or something else, but I for my part am feeling lucky that you were there when I got lost. I don’t care about the how..”, Tony’s hand had crept up to cup Loki’s chin slowly and like a cat Loki pressed into it.

“The wrong sigil. It should have sealed off the other room completely from my magic but it did not.  The magic inside you allowed you to slip through. You were swept into an other dimension together with Wanda and me. A dimension only magical beings can access. I can not remember much after I found you, just that I got lost and something called me back.”, Loki clarified way more calm than before. His green eyes never left Tony’s brown ones and he seemed to be searching for something. If it was true that he did not remember what happened after he found Tony, then he also did not remember the connection they had there. At least not on a conscious level, even if he also had to feel the draw between them that was growing with every moment, urging them to get closer together, to share whatever could be shared in this physical world.

 

 “Then I am thankful, that he made that mistake. I am thankful that you found  me there and I am thankful that you came back.”, Tony whispered and closed the last gap between them, sealing their lips together for the first time in the physical world. It was different than in the other dimension but not lacking in any quality. Different but oh so good. Loki’s lips were soft and pliant under his own and nobody could call Loki unpassionate. He was a wildfire that surrounded you and consumed every clear thought. He was a god that demanded worshipping and he was Tony’s. Just his.

 

When the lack of air demanded them to part, they did so unwillingly. Breathing hard they laid their foreheads together and just now did Tony realize that there were wandering hands on his arms, his back and everywhere else too. It also smelled differently. Less dust and more the clean scent of “not his labs”. Slightly irritated he glanced to the side and recognized his apartment around them.

 

“You teleported us? You can use your magic again?”, Tony asked astonished. He could not remember the feeling of movement at any point.

Loki’s thumb traced the outline of Tony’s mouth – soft skin, very soft skin he noticed.

“Yes, some of it but not much by a long stretch. Just enough to shift us here. I thought you would prefer to celebrate your awakening in a more….private surrounding. But if you insist we can of course go back to them. I do so like to see my brothers horrified face from time to time.”, Loki answered and Tony could smell the magic in his breath - ozone and fresh rain in a green forest if he should ever want to describe it – before he deliberately shook his head.

 

Tony grinned diabolically and placed his hand squarely over Loki’s leather clad hindside.

“Tempting. You definitely have to teach me how to use my magic. Shifting is a nifty trick. I want you to teach me everything you know. But at the moment: no. You are mine and I do not like it when others touch my stuff…or my ass, witch in this case incudes both mine and your ass.”

 

A short laugh escaped Loki at this point and he opened his eyes to search the brown ones of Tony. “I remember now. I especially remember your fixation on my ass when you called for me. Is there anything special you would like to do to it or are you just fixated?”, he inquired with a lot of mirth in his voice and a hand that searched for the buttons of Tony’s shirt.

 

“Oh, there are many things I want to do to it. You want a list? It would be a long list…a very long list. Could take us years to work through it. I could set up Jarvis to make the list. We could write it together. Somebody as old as you just has to have some good ideas what we could do to such a fine ass. Hey look at that. Another thing you can teach me! So many things to teach me, we should start immediately with it, don’t you think?”, Tony rambled when the leather straps on Loki’s outfit did not cooperate quickly enough.

Tony could physically feel the eyeroll Loki did then.

 

“Do you _ever_ shut up?”, the god asked and cut one of the straps with a knife – where did that come from? Magic? Oh, Tony liked magic more and more – before handing it to Tony who proceeded to cut Loki out if his uncooperative gear.

 

“That might be difficult but there _are_ some tricks you could use.”, Tony conformed and finally got rid of the first layer of leather. Before he could start with the next cut his hand was caught and he looked up to see if he had done anything wrong.

 

“Then teach me, _please_.”, Loki begged desperately.

 

Tony grinned evilly. Oh yes, begging. Tony liked begging. And he begged so prettily even before Tony really started to _make_ him beg. This was something he should definitely encourage in the god’s behavior.

With a short flick of his hand he discarded the knife to somewhere behind him and laid his right hand on Lokis throat. Not enough force to choke, just enough to show him what he got into and what was to be expected.

There was no resistance or defense to be met, even if Tony almost was convinced that Loki would not allow such a behavior. He even stretched his head back slowly to give Tony more space. Surprises after surprises.

 

“Oh believe me, I will teach you. I will teach you so much.”

 

*****

 

“What exactly just happened here Thor?”, Steve asked and tried to suppress the twitch in his right eye while his left arm still hovered in the air where he once held Loki just seconds ago.

 

Thor lowered his own hand from where he seized his brother back by his shoulder and stared at the exact place where Tony and Loki had started kissing.

“I…I don’t know.”, he stammered and added a terrorized “And I do not want to know!”, before just sitting down in the middle of the room between the debris that laid there.

 

“Should we maybe..search for them?”, Steve suggested in lieu of anything more intelligent to state.

 

“Are you mad?! Nothing in all worlds would persuade me to search for them now. No! We…we can search for them in about…two hours maybe. Let’s give it three…or four. Then we can search them..maybe.”, Thor spoke with empty eyes. There were things you just did not want to see your little brother doing. Not even the mighty Thor would survive such a sight unscarred.

“Tony and Loki…who would have thought? And Tony is a sorcerer?”, Steve mumbled before laughing out loud suddenly. Confused Thor looked up to him.

 

“You know what Tony always says about you? That there is always a “But” with everything you do. And now.:”, he had to stop let out an other deep laugh.

“Now you are sitting on your “butt”, after one of your plans turned out to have a “But”!”, he blurted out and almost toppled over with laughter.

Thor just sat there and did not even blink. Mortals were strange.

 

“Come on Thor! That is funny!”, Steve insisted and kept on laughing even when Thor finally stood up und shuffled out of the room with a grim expression on his face.

 

“And Thor? It’s Tony…we can search for them tomorrow morning. We should prepare for everything...or the worst with these two.”, Steve called after him and erupted in a new bout of laughter when Thor froze for a second and drew in his shoulders as if he just swallowed a whole lemon.

 

 

 

 

 


End file.
